Academic Commons Survey Results:

CUNY ACADEMIC COMMONS

User Personas

May 20, 2016

METHODOLOGY Over the course of two months, the Academic Commons team launched a survey consisting of 32 questions across the 24 campuses. These questions targeted key features of the website while focusing on detailed use-cases for an array of Commons users. We also included basic demographic questions to understand the background of users.

After collecting the data, we were able to get a better insight on who we serve, as well as a deeper understanding what our users are currently doing and want out of our site. With our data, we were able to develop four personas of the most common users. These will allow us to prioritize how we will improve the Commons in the future and and make development decisions moving forward.

OVERALL RESULTSParticipants completed a five minute survey. The goal was to determine who we are serving and what users are currently doing within the site.

Participants and survey analysis:

•Total participants: 481 people

•58% Faculty

•29% Graduate students

•18% Staff + Administrators

•40% Affiliate with the CUNY Graduate Center

•36% Have never used the CUNY Academic Commons

HOW DID YOU HEAR ABOUT US?The 36% of respondents that have never used the Commons were asked: Where did you first hear about the CUNY Academic Commons? Most common responses were:

•Email notifications

•Faculty/Staff meetings

•Colleagues/Friends

•From a CUNY Commons members

•Links on a CUNY webpage

•Department orientations

•Department-wide emails

•Digital posters

• IT Conferences

•58% Groups

•47% Sites and/or Blogs

•19% Events

•15% Profile and Portfolio

•13% Member Connection and Friendship

•11% Digital Research Tools

•9% Docs

•5% Site-wide Newsfeed

•3% Social Paper

•5% Other

In order to optimize the accuracy of how our website is being utilized, we separated the data to analyze the 64% of respondents who indicated they currently use or have used the Commons.

Respondents were asked to pick key features that they used within the CUNY Academic Commons. This allowed us to see where our wide audience recalls spending most of their time on the site. Respondents were allowed to select as many features as they wanted

64% USE THE COMMONS TOP FEATURES

•Sample Size: 292 people

•42% Faculty

•18% Graduate students

•16% Staff and Administration

•14% Graduate Students with multiple roles

•10% Other

PERSONASIn order to best present the data, we sorted users into four groups based on how they themselves recognized their roles within CUNY. By doing this, our analysis gave us a better understanding of our core audience and their use cases. This gave us confidence in our persona summaries and based on the results, the four main groups are:

➤ Graduate Students

➤ Graduate Students with multiple roles within CUNY

➤ Faculty

➤ Staff and Administration

“The Commons provides an intuitive platform for a variety of needs like networking, idea development and critique, and digital research tools.”

\

Age Range: 22-34

Department: English

Area of Study: Digital Humanities

Graduate Students who use the Commons frequent the site around 2-3 times a week. Most commonly, they use their time to increase their academic presence online. As they are career driven, it’s important to be a part of an academic community for both its council and mentorship. They promote their professional works and achievements within the CUNY profiles but, more popularly, through their academic groups. Graduate students utilize the Commons to find like minded CUNY affiliates to share their ideas and gain confidence in the works.

Visits the Commons 2-3 times a week

Responds every few weeks to

Commons emails

Accesses the Commons via

laptop

Hunter College&CUNY Graduate Center

Graduate Student

Graduate Students with Multiple Roles Within CUNY

CUNY Graduate Center

“The Commons allows me to experiment with websites, connect with peers and classmates, and have a public persona.”

Age Range: 35-44

Department: English

Area of Studies: Linguistics

These users have immersed themselves in multiple CUNY roles and, despite their busy schedules, utilize the Commons frequently to access sites and/or blogs. Because they access the Commons every few weeks, these users strategically connect to collaborate with peers who are generally those whom they share a class with. They also access the Commons to read and discover works of their peers in order to gain inspiration for an academic site and/or blog of their own.

Visits the Commons every

few weeks

Responds once a month to

Commons emails

Accesses the Commons via

laptop

Faculty

New York City College of Technology

Age Range: 45-54

Department: Library

Area of Studies: Education

Visits the Commons once a

month

Responds every few weeks to

Commons emails

Accesses the Commons via

laptop

Faculty users find it essential to be able to connect with colleagues and peers within CUNY through the Commons. By joining groups related to their academic interest(s), they take part in conversations within group forums, send announcements to other group members, and stay informed by reading the recent group activity. Within their groups, the faculty is kept up to date with what is happening around CUNY and they especially like to find events to attend within their groups or across the CUNY campuses.

“I mainly use the Commons to keep up with activities and discussions in groups to which I belong. So the Commons connects me to a University-wide service!”

Staff and Administrators

Queensborough Community College

Staff and administrators use the Commons about once a month in order to remain informed as to what is happening around CUNY. They find the membership connection and friendship features most valuable because it keeps them connected to the ever growing community. Valuing what their groups discuss, they enjoy finding other Commons users who share similar academic interests and invite them into their Commons groups. They enjoy expanding their academic knowledge and find that connecting digitally with new members creates engaging academic discussions.

Accesses the Commons via

desktop

Age Range: 55-64

Department: Library

Area of Studies: Sociology

“One of the best academic community platforms I have used and an important model for other communities.”

Visits the Commons less

than once a month

Responds every few weeks to

Commons emails

SO WHERE SHOULD WE PRIORITIZE? Based on the data and what we now know about our users we feel confident about focusing on the following features:

➤ Groups

➤ Sites/Blogs

➤ Profile and Portfolios

➤ Events Calendar

FROM THE USERS“Service that lets groups run online events/webinars (basic

functions that you'd find in WebEx or Adobe Connect).”

What could we offer?

“A more intuitive interface; the ability to share content from outside of the Commons more easily. More help filtering and discovering.”

“A list and tutorial of all that's available on the Academic Commons”

What do you enjoy about the Commons? “It’s an incredible resource that makes tools for both short-term and long-term project needs for web presence and group collaboration easy and accessible.”

“Commons provides an intuitive platform for a variety of needs like networking, idea development and critique, and digital research tools.”

“I find it helpful in that I can see what others are doing and also bounce my ideas off of peers.”